The Madras High Court has suggested that the Election Commission of India (ECI) can ask State governments to create an infrastructure that could be used for storing polled Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) and also for counting votes, during every election than requisition government medical college buildings for months together and spend crores of rupees to retrofit them.
Chief Justice Sanjay V. Gangapurwala and Justice D. Bharatha Chakravarthy were surprised to hear that nearly ₹2 crore was to be spent for making temporary alterations to the Government Medical College building in Madurai for storing the EVMs and counting of votes during this year’s Lok Sabha elections. They said a new building could be constructed elsewhere in the city by spending a little more.
The judges also felt educational institutions in general and medical colleges, in particular, should not be used as vote counting centres since it might affect students for months together due to restrictions in movement. They said Madurai Medical College should be avoided at least from the next elections and directed the Madurai Collector to find out if it could be done even for this year’s election.
